


The Angry Library Aide

by AozoraNoShita



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Blood and Injury, Homelessness, M/M, More tags and characters to be added, Swearing, but not suPER graphic, people talking a lot and giving each other Significant Looks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:22:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28110831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AozoraNoShita/pseuds/AozoraNoShita
Summary: Alfred hides in the library after a fight with his arch-nemesis. Lovino the Library Aide is not amused.
Relationships: America/South Italy (Hetalia)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 9





	The Angry Library Aide

**Author's Note:**

> This is a completed story that I'm crossposting from FFNet! I'm editing as I go but the whole thing should be up pretty quickly for a total of 13 chapters and 42k words. The story was written over the course of 5 years, starting in high school and ending in college. I'm making minor edits but it IS a story I started in high school so y'know. Don't be too harsh on teenage me. Further edits might be made as I find plot things that don't make sense later on. Or I'll just retcon, whichever.
> 
> Thanks for checking this out! And in the spirit of the original start of this fic, this is a shoutout to Coffee-Flavored-Fate, who was singlehandedly responsible for my 93,214 published words of Romerica fic and a whole lot of time spent thinking about these dumbasses. Hope you're doing well.

Looking back on it everything was a bit fuzzy. First there was annoyance. Increasing steadily until it peaked at rage. There were words involved in there somewhere, but he couldn’t remember specifically what either of them had said. Just the hurt.

After—and during—the rage, there had been movement. Air rushing past his face, over his fists as he swung wildly. Counterpoint to the unremembered words they were slinging at each other.

Then, suddenly. The words stopped, the movement stopped, the rage disappeared.

Right. Because his opponent had punched him. In the mouth, cutting off his shouted taunts, the words. He had stilled as he tried to take assessment of the damage, stopped dancing around to just stand and feel the red ooze slowly—while the other guy had just watched, of fucking course, but the point was owshit _fuck_ he was _bleeding_ ).

Rage was replaced with disbelief. His opponent had actually managed to hit him. The kind of blow that showed he was not fucking around, that he _meant_ it. That must have been why—when the other said " _l_ _eave, now_ " so, _s_ _o_ condescendingly—he obeyed. He turned tail and left.

It seemed utterly unheroic, now that he looked back on it. And here he was, huddled between the shelves for mythology and linguistics inside the college library. He held his hands to his face, trying to staunch the flow of blood from both his nose and his split lip simultaneously. That asshole had huge hands; he would swear that punch had hit the entire lower half of his face.

He was starting to contemplate using some pages from a book to mop up the blood because seriously, this was ridiculous. As if on cue, a library aide showed up to foil his plan. He tried to sit still and not attract attention.

Ha. Like that ever worked.

The aide caught sight of him and squealed, which was kind of a funny sound, but still meant the jig was up. Didn’t hurt to try and be casual, though. The last thing he needed was some university employee calling the cops, or worse, the _dean_.

"Hello," he said. He moved his hand in a vague waving motion and attempted to smile around the red. Even as he did it he knew it had to look terrifying, but he maintained the smile rather than let it turn into a grimace.

"What the hell?" Library Aide exclaimed.

"Shh," he hissed reprovingly. "We're in a library." To be fair, his own speaking voice was just as loud as this guy’s exclamation. Whoops.

" _You_ be quiet," Aide retorted, and turned with a huff to look at the books on the shelf nearest to him. Was he not going to say anything about the blood?

"My name's Alfred," he said as soon as it was clear he was being ignored.

"Good for you."

Pause.

"Do you have any tissues?" Alfred asked.

The aide began muttering angrily, but didn't answer him.

"Hello? Mr. Angry Library Dude? Did you hear my question? I asked if you had—"

"I heard you the first time, stupid. Stop bothering me and go bleed somewhere else."

Wow, seriously? Not that he wanted this guy to make a fuss but still.

"But I'll get blood everywhere."

The aide finally turned and met his eyes again—utterly unimpressed.

Maybe he should stop annoying this guy? "...So do you have any tissues?" Nah.

That looked like the start of an eye twitch. "No."

"Oh. That's okay."

Aide turned back to the shelf, and Alfred watched him for a bit. He wasn't actually doing anything, just fiddling with the books and not really organizing them.

"So what are you doing?" Alfred asked.

"Working. Obviously."

"No you're not."

"Shut up! Am so!" Aide's face got red; he was obviously feeling defensive. So he _wasn't_ working. Wow.

"So what are _you_ doing?" Aide asked, tone mocking Alfred's earlier question, peering intently at a book he was flipping through while apparently not actually reading it.

"Bleeding."

"Well I can see that."

"No you can't, you're not looking at me."

" _Che palle_ , don't play dumb with me! You know what I meant!" Aide turned to glare at him once more, completely disregarding the books now. Was that Italian? There was a bit of an accent there.

Alfred smiled at him again. He’d finally caught a glimpse of the elusive name tag, pinned sideways and half-hidden under the collar of the uniform.

_Terra College Library: LOVINO_

Oh yeah, he would make an awesome secret agent.

"So what do you do when you actually _are_ working?" Alfred asked.

"What do you think, moron? I work in a library."

"Well I can see that," he parroted with a badly mangled Italian accent.

"You—!" Lovino made as if he were about to hit him with a book. Alfred stuck his hands up in preemptive defense—only to have Lovino pause and stare at him.

"That looks pretty bad," he murmured.

"Yep," responded Alfred cheerfully. "I think I lost a tooth!"

Lovino was still staring, which Alfred was _not_ about.

"Wanna help me look for it?" he offered. Lovino's lip curled as he leaned back slightly.

"Why in the hell would I do that?"

He poked curiously at his own mouth, feeling it out. "Isn't it your job to help me find lost things?"

"I help the students find books! Not lost teeth!" Lovino looked genuinely horrified. The over-the-top expression made him want to laugh but he bit it back. Ow. His mouth still hurt like hell, he concluded.

Lovino huffed. "Are you even a student here?"

"Nope. Do I _look_ like I can afford a private college?"

Seemingly taken aback, Lovino answered reluctantly. "Well. No, not really." Which was refreshingly frank.

Alfred waved it off. "I'm happy you thought I might be a student here, actually. Mostly people accuse me of being a bagrant or something."

"Might that be 'vagrant'?"

"Whatever. Plus I'm not actually old enough to be in college yet. So I look older than I actually am, huh? That's pretty cool."

"I guess, bastard."

"Bastard's a pretty common one, too! How did you know?"

"Idiot!" (Alfred decided Lovino looked awfully cute when he was flustered.) "Why are you even here, then?"

"I'm recuperating after an epic battle with my arch-nemesis."

Lovino tsked. "More like hiding."

"Am not!" Alfred protested immediately. Now Lovino looked vaguely amused, a smile tempting his face for the first time.

"Why don't you just go home and 'recuperate' there? Away from the books. Which are easily stained."

"No way, you’re totally enjoying my company," Alfred said with a grin. He could feel the sticky stretch of dried blood on his mouth as he spoke. "And you don't really care about the books."

Lovino scoffed, but didn't deny it.

"Besides—I don’t have a home to go back to."

Totally worth it to drop that one just to see the shocked look on the aide’s face.

"Well! Better go look for my tooth! See you tomorrow, Lovi!" He hopped up and hurried away to find a bathroom now that the blood had finally stopped. He definitely needed to wash off a little bit before he headed back out.

Lovino watched him go. "How did he know my—wait, tomorrow?"

**Author's Note:**

> Original chapter ending notes:  
> So, this was done as a prompt in my creative writing class. The conditions were 1) a college library, 2) a homeless kid, and 3) something lost.  
> I hope someone caught that one line from the English dub. And a brief Aladdin reference. Yeaaah.  
> .  
> .  
> .  
> Me now: I took out the Aladdin reference, sorry past me. Can't believe it's been years since I actually watched any Hetalia and I can still hear the English dub line perfectly. If anyone is interested, Alfred is 17 and Lovino is 19 in this fic, which seemed very relatable when I was in high school. Other changes made in this chapter were just making it less stylistically weird, changing some speaking tags around, dropping a plot hint, and making Alfred more of an asshole.


End file.
